CANCER
GROUPS, PLANNED PARENTHOOD TEAM UP AGAINST ABORTION-BREAST CANCER LINK

By Karen MalecJuly 11, 2003NewsWithViews.com

The American Cancer Society (ACS)
and the Susan G. Komen Foundation tipped their hands when their
officials teamed up with officials from Planned Parenthood (PP)
by signing on to a May 13, 2003 commentary published in The Post-Standard
(Syracuse, New York). [1] The commentary, written by a local physician,
Patricia Numann, labeled biological evidence for the link and 29
peer-reviewed, epidemiological studies reporting risk elevations
as "misinformation." She asserted that, "The scientific research
does not support the theory that abortion causes breast cancer."

It is worth mentioning that in
a more recent article published in the Los Angeles Times, Mary Coyne,
a board member of the ACS' Texas division, denied the existence
of this research altogether. She declared, "There is just no research
that supports this claim (of an abortion-breast cancer link)." [2]
PP joined the ACS chorus. Claudia Stravato, chief executive of Planned
Parenthood of Amarillo and the Texas Panhandle, declared "They don't
care what science says. It's like talking to the Flat Earth Society."
Yet PP's Web site described the biological theory perfectly in 1997,
and to this day the theory remains unchallenged and unrefuted. [3]

Five medical organizations strongly
disagree with the cancer groups' position. [4] For instance, Angela
Lanfranchi, MD, a breast cancer surgeon and vice president of the
Breast Cancer Prevention Institute, argues there is more evidence
for abortion as a risk factor for the disease than for any other
known risk factor.

A collaborative effort between
PP and cancer groups creates the appearance of collusion. A similar
occurrence developed in late February 2002 when Women's E-News,
an internet wire service funded by the NOW Legal Defense Fund, announced
that its staff expected the National Cancer Institute (NCI) to revise
its web page discussing the abortion-breast cancer (ABC) research
in coming weeks. [5] Less than a month later, the NCI's March 6
fact sheet was posted. Subsequently, several experts, including
U.S. Rep. Dave Weldon, M.D., endocrinologist Joel Brind, Ph.D.,
and three physicians, each charged that the agency posted misinformation
about the findings of scientists who have conducted ABC research.
[6-8] Perhaps not coincidentally, the revised web page was posted
only three short weeks before a significant false advertising case
against an abortion clinic went to trial in North Dakota. The clinic's
staff was accused by the plaintiff of distributing a pamphlet, which
denied the existence of research implicating abortion as a risk
factor for breast cancer. [9]

The NOW-PP-cancer group alliance
appears to be worried about the impact of groups like the Coalition
on Abortion/Breast Cancer, which educate the public about the medical
literature. Recently, Syracuse volunteers distributed coalition
brochures at a local fairground during a cancer walk sponsored by
the Komen Foundation. Syracuse volunteers believe that Numann's
disinformation in The Post-Standard was the alliance's response
to their educational efforts. After all, her commentary was published
with lightening speed only two days later.

It is customary for ABC opponents
to omit any discussion of the more than two dozen studies finding
a positive relationship between abortion and the disease. Numann
and her allies didn't depart from this practice. They fell back
on the standard party line that a single study, Melbye et al. 1997,
made it possible for the cancer and the abortion industries to trash
more than two dozen studies reporting a positive relationship. [10,11]
It is a study paid for in part by the US Department of Defense,
and its authors found no overall increase in risk.

During the last six years, the
alliance asserted that Melbye et al. is a study beyond reproach.
Women were led to believe that it is complete in all respects -
an absolutely "flawless" study. What they omitted was the fact that
even Melbye and his colleagues found a statistically significant
89% risk elevation among women choosing an abortion after 18 weeks
gestation. Recently, this finding was widely reported by the coalition
and other groups. As a result, Melbye et al. "reanalyzed" the data
from their allegedly "perfect" study. And voila! At the NCI's February
workshop, Mads Melbye announced that this finding was no longer
present in the research.

Moreover, the "flawless" study
was severely criticized for its errors of misclassification and
data adjustment. [12] In a subsequent study, Melbye et al. 1999,
the team's errors were implicitly corrected, and they found that
pre-term birth before 32 weeks gestation more than doubles a woman's
risk of breast cancer. - findings which are consistent with the
biological explanation for the ABC link. [13]

As badly as the alliance wants
the ABC link to go away, it can't be dismissed. Not one of their
scientists has been able to deny the biological explanation for
the link. During a normal pregnancy, a woman is overexposed to estrogen,
a female hormone known to stimulate the growth of tumors. Overexposure
to this secondary carcinogen is only corrected by a third trimester
process which matures cancer vulnerable cells (Type 1 and 2 lobules)
into cancer-resistant, milk producing tissue (Type 3 and 4 lobules).

Scientists have reported that,
once a woman has a full term pregnancy, her breast tissue is permanently
altered. If viewed under a microscope, the tissue resembles tiny
bunches of grapes. It is tissue matured for the purpose of milk
production - clusters of milk-secreting alveoli. It is a far more
complex situation than what is present in the breast tissue of a
woman who has never had a full term pregnancy. Her tissue, by contrast,
is made up of primitive, immature, terminal end buds and ducts.

In 1980, Russo and Russo found
that more aborted rats develop breast cancer if exposed to a carcinogen
(DMBA) than rats with full term pregnancies and virgin rats. They
observed under a microscope that rats with term pregnancies had
more mature breast cells than did post-abortive rats. They said,
"Therefore, while pregnancy and lactation protected the mammary
gland from developing carcinomas and benign lesions by induction
of full differentiation, pregnancy interruption did not elicit sufficient
differentiation in the gland to be protective...." [14]

In a subsequent study, Russo
and Russo wrote, " In women, protection against breast cancer is
provided when pregnancy occurs before age 24. In contrast, abortion
is associated with increased risk of breast cancer. The explanation
for these epidemiologic findings is not known, but the parallelism
between the DMBA-induced rat mammary carcinoma model and the human
situation is striking." [15]

The ACS and the Komen Foundation
are behaving as if the NCI's recent workshop were a kind of lifeboat
which will help to save them from being asked hard questions about
their failure to inform women about scientists' findings decades
ago. In actuality, the NCI is a sinking ship. The agency's efforts
to continue this government cover-up have inflicted considerable
harm on its credibility in recent years. Its manipulation of the
ABC research and the workshop's proceedings for political ends -
an effort instigated by US Representatives Henry Waxman, Nita Lowey
and 10 other members of Congress who protested the NCI's removal
of its misleading March 6, 2002 fact sheet - will return to haunt
the NCI for many decades to come. [16]

The Coalition on Abortion/Breast
Cancer is an international women's organization founded to protect
the health and save the lives of women by educating and providing
information on abortion as a risk factor for breast cancer.

Karen Malec is President of the Coalition on
Abortion/Breast Cancer From Dec., 1999 to present The coalition is an
international women’s organization whose mission is to protect the health
and save the lives of women by educating and providing information about
abortion as a risk factor for breast cancer.

Author "The Abortion-Breast Cancer Link: How
Politics Trumped Science and Informed Consent," Journal of American Physicians
and Surgeons, summer 2003 A publication of the Association of American
Physicians and Surgeons.

Author RFM News and Illinois Leader Wrote multiple
articles published by an Internet wire service and a news Web site.

Accredited Journalist and Panel Discussion Participant
United Nations Conference on the Rights of the Child, June 2001 Participated
on a panel discussion of the abortion-breast cancer research and worked
as an accredited journalist at the conference for Salem Radio News.

Lectured on the abortion-breast cancer research
at U.S. and European conferences.

Authored, organized and developed most of the
coalition’s Web site, www.AbortionBreastCancer.com
with the assistance of medical advisers, Joel Brind, Ph.D. and internist,
Chris Kahlenborn, M.D. The Web site has been described by international
expert, Dr. Brind, as, "THE clearinghouse for up-to-date information on
scientific, medical, political and legal fronts."

"It is worth mentioning that
in a more recent article published in the Los Angeles Times, Mary Coyne,
a board member of the ACS' Texas division, denied the existence of this
research altogether. She declared, "There is just no research that supports
this claim (of an abortion-breast cancer link)."